


Old Books

by TheMulletWhisperer



Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Bumbling Sadass, Desperate Sadass, Don't regret the beginning, F/M, Okay I do a little bit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-30
Updated: 2016-05-30
Packaged: 2018-07-11 02:04:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7021279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMulletWhisperer/pseuds/TheMulletWhisperer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Desperate to please Galina, Arkved goes on a hunt for something to help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Old Books

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally intended to be long but...my attention span doesn't last that long.

Sadri’s Used Wares. Run by an inferior mer. Hmph.

This is exactly what Arkved was  _ not _ thinking as he rifled through a box of things he really didn’t understand at all. However, the Dunmer had told him that it’d help out with ‘pleasing’ Galina, so he went with it. 

Ever since their first time in the cave, he’d felt like he was doing something...wrong. Maybe he wasn’t doing his part,  _ something _ , but it all felt off. Whatever it was, he felt like he desperately needed to fix it, and fast. He wasn’t afraid to admit that he was scared of losing her because he was doing something wrong.

Maybe if--and his entire train of thought was cut off right then and there at the sight of a large penis carved out of what looked like oak wood with a shine applied to it came into sight just on top of an old book. Lovely, yes, but he already had a penis and Galina probably didn’t want one. 

He hoped.

He really didn’t want to buy that.

The book seemed oddly out of place, though. In a box full of rather lewd items and toys, the book, bound rather simply with an unremarkable cover stood out like a sore thumb to the observant Justiciar. 

Sticking his hand into the box and trying not to touch the wooden penis was probably the greatest challenge he’d faced in his life, but he overcame it, grabbing the book by the binding and dumping the oaken phallus into the bottom of the accursed crate. Sadri looked at him like he was crazy, but gave a little shrug. If he was a paying customer he was a paying customer.

Arkved set a bag of coin down on the table, “Here you are. Eighty superior coins for this book.”

Sadri rolled his eyes and took the gold, depositing it under the counter. “Don’t forget to tell your friends.”

“I have no friends. I have inferiors.”   


“Yeah well I can see why you have no friends. Go on, I’ve got to close up.”

The Altmer stepped out of the shop into the cold air of the Gray Quarter, flipping his nondescript hood up and trudging through the blizzard towards the tavern. He decidedly  _ ignored _ the looks of the Nords that he passed. 

As he pushed into the tavern, the keeper didn’t even bother to acknowledge his existence as he sped past quickly towards his room. What could he say. The Nord was scary.

As he shut the door behind him and decidedly blocked out the noise of the inn, the robed Altmer pulled up a chair and sat down in the corner, flipping the book open to the first page.  _ ‘The House Call’ _ , it read. 

_ “Odd name for a book…” _ He mused to himself, before flipping to the first page. Already, it was horridly dull and uninteresting, but he forced himself to push on.

_ A knock came at the door from the other side of Ahnassi’s home, prompting her to the door rather swiftly as she scuttled across the oak wood floor thing things-- _

“Floor things?” The startling lack of care put into the book astounded Arkved, “Floor things...this is going to be a long night.” Uncorking a glass bottle filled with chilled water, he settled in for a night of reading. And about halfway through the book, he knew exactly what he had to do. At least, he thought he did.

=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=

To put it as lightly and as kindly as possible--the outfit he was wearing was uncomfortable and downright ugly. After spending almost an entire day watching Nords labor away and whatever it was they were laboring away at, he’d gleaned that they were awfully inferior dressers; a fact that he’d tried to mirror by buying the rattiest clothes he could find.

The shirt he wore was missing its sleeves, his trousers were scratchy and patched in multiple places, and his shoes were...well, sandals. In one hand, he carried some odd looking tool that looked like someone had stuck a sharp metal banana to a stick and filled it with lead, and of course he’d made sure to smear dirt on his face, just to complete the ‘authentic’ worker look. 

With that, he knocked on the door to the house, waiting for Galina to open it. He had his key, of course, but the book was very explicit. The worker had  _ knocked  _ on the door. As the door swung open, Arkved scrambled to get himself into character, hooking a finger under his rope belt and resting his weight on his back foot. He had to bite his tongue to stop from smiling as Galina appeared.

“He--eyyy...what are…” She tried to greet him, but was caught completely off-guard by his...unusual attire.

“Greet--hello, ma’am. I am here to fix your…” He paused a moment. Galina’s bed wasn’t broken, and he had to improvise. He wasn’t stupid, so he pointed out the first thing he saw. “Bird.” He panicked. He had panicked. He had one chance, he had one job, and he blew it. He could still recover, though. 

Galina was obviously hopelessly confused, “Bird? Arkved, did you hit your head on...did you hit your head?”

“No, ma’am, but I got a letter that you...wanted to um...you wanted me to fix your wooden bird. It fell and...you need to fix...to get it fixed?”

For the longest time, Galina only stared at him and blinked rapidly. It took almost two minutes for her to finally speak up. “Have you been reading?”

“Reading? No of course not! I am a Nord, see?!”

“Arkved.”

“Who is Arkved?”

“ _ Arkved _ .”

He paused a moment. “What?”

“You’ve been reading, haven’t you?”

“...Yes.”

“Uh-huh.” A chuckle slipped from her throat and she gestured him inside. “Come on, get changed.”

Without hesitation or even an indignant word, he rushed inside and straight to the dresser, quite literally ripping the clothing from his body and pulling the Justiciar rest uniform on. Once he was nice and comfortable, he turned back and looked at her with a sigh. “I’m sorry, Galina I just wanted to make you happy and I saw this book and I read the book and it was all about a Khajiit fixing a bed and then having sex with another Khajiit and the writing was really bad and so was the dialogue and it was really inferior to Altmer text but I thought you’d like it bec--” He was shut up by her lips on his, though he continued his muffled rambling for more than a few seconds before his brain caught up with his mouth.

Once Galina was both satisfied and sure that he was going to be quiet, she pulled back and wrapped her arms around his waist, resting the side of her head on his chest.

“You’re a sweet Sadass. You know that?”

“Hey!”

“Oh don’t gimme that.”

“Sorry, sorry. I was just really worried that I wasn’t pleasing you and--” 

“Arkved.”

“And I really just wanted to please you an--”

“ARKVED!”   
  
“What?!”

In his trance, he hadn’t noticed Galina dragging them both towards the bed. “Shut up and come here you big Nord.”

Judging by how quickly the birds flew away from the house, they would definitely need fixing now.


End file.
